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Lucille
Michael celebrated his 18th birthday dressed in a finely pressed suit- as black as Tommy would wear- and tucked away in the Shelbys' private room, a glass of whiskey freshly in hand. He'd objected to the drink at first, but Lucille knew it was just for show. The boy was more like his mother's side of the family than Pol would have liked to admit. He tipped the drink back with only the slightest of grimaces, embracing his cousins as if he'd grown up with them his whole life, and when he was handed a pocket watch as a welcoming to the business, he grinned wider than what should have been possible.
It was warming to see and still, Lucille could not help but worry. Polly still did not know of the attack on their outing to purchase the horse and if Tommy had his way, she would not know at all. But Michael had settled in too quickly to that way of life, jumping the gun and driving them all home, even as Arthur swore against the blood that coated his hands- almost all of it not his own.
It was hypocritical in some way she supposed, to worry over such things. Hadn't she arrived in Small Heath with such blindness to Tommy's business? But that was not blindness, she knew. No, because Lucille had never been the meek kind. She'd shot a German soldier and helped two English ones to escape imprisonment. Nothing about the woman described someone who would shy away from such things.
She didn't share those worries. Another concern had taken her entire attention, keeping her face drawn tight even as Adds hung to her arm and Tommy leaned in to place a kiss on her cheek, earning a round of claps from the table as it was rare he would ever do so much in public. Perhaps he'd recognised that deep look of anxiety that appeared as swiftly as it would often go. She felt his hand against her back, sliding to grip her waist as he knew to do when she needed to be pulled back and grounded again. Her heels dug into the ground and she concentrated on his touch, the feeling of Tommy's hands on her that she'd grown as used to as her own body. Anything to relieve her of this anxiety.
But the worry was relentless. It'd plagued her ever since the boy had gone to London in retaliation.
Dawson hadn't come back.
He was alright, she knew, because Arthur had come back to Birmingham singing his praises, naming him an honorary member of the Peaky Blinders. It hadn't sounded right next to the man's name, especially coming from Arthur's drunken lips, but John had confirmed it all: Dawson had taken his revenge naturally, savagely. She feared that soon he would be too far gone down his tunnel of anger. There was only one thing she could think to do.
Whether Ada had already been invited to the birthday gathering in the Garrison or not, Lucille didn't know, but neither did that stop her from pleading with the younger girl to show her face. Even from the other side of the phone, Lucille had heard the reluctance behind her voice. Ada was distancing herself from her brothers... and yet she showed.
